Bitter Recoil by Steven F Havill

Author:Steven F Havill [Havill, Steven F]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: (¯`'•.¸//(*_*)\\¸.•'´¯)
ISBN: 189020840X
Publisher: Poisoned Pen Press
Published: 2011-05-25T00:00:00+00:00

17

The corpse lay on his face, arms and legs outstretched like he’d been bashed to the ground by a giant club.

A bloodstain the size of a dinner plate soaked his denim work shirt. The shirt was old and faded, with plenty of rips here and there, the kind barbed wire would tear when a man’s a little careless ducking through fences.

I stepped closer. The seven small holes in the center of his back weren’t from barbs…and they were grouped tightly enough that I could have covered them with my hand.

Without moving my feet I twisted around looking for spent shell casings. There were none. I walked backward the way I had come, trying not to disturb the arroyo bottom. A half dozen times I thought I had found a shell casing, but it was only the sun winking from the quartz-loaded stream gravel.

At the juniper I turned around. Downstream, the ambulance crew was just making preparations to load Cecil Lucero’s body on the gurney. I whistled sharply. Estelle ReyesGuzman must have read the urgency on my face, because she got off her knees where she’d been photographing the .22 rifle and walked up the arroyo to meet me.

“I don’t think this is a simple hunting accident,” I said.

“Why? What did you find?”

“There’s another corpse, just around the corner. And he didn’t fall on his own gun.”

“Shot?”

“Yes.”

“For sure murder?”

“No doubt. Seven times in the back. That’s tough to do by accident.”

“Son of a bitch,” Estelle breathed. It was the first time I’d ever heard her curse. She touched my elbow. “Lead me up there. I’ll walk in your tracks.”

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